Sherry Peel Jackson was a former IRS employee who discovered the truth about the income tax and started speaking out and sharing her knowledge with people. She was arrested for a non-crime and sentenced to 4 years in prison. Her story is a travesty and more people should know about it.

This is utterly ridiulous! The police department and the city government of Detroit should be ashamed of themselves!

Taken from yahoo news:

A Detroit man who called 911 three times to report a break-in at his mother’s apartment has been ticketed for “misuse” of the emergency line, even though the reason he kept calling was because it took police hours to show up.

Sean Street told Detroit Fox affiliate WJBK-TV his mother called him when she returned home and saw her front door had been kicked in. He called 911, then jumped in his car to go over to her apartment.

It took him an hour to get there, and when he arrived police hadn’t shown up. He made another 911 call and another hour later they still hadn’t come by, so he called a third time.

“[There] was no profanity whatsoever. I was very polite with them. The officer actually seemed very polite, also, and he told me let us handle it. Don’t take matters into your own hands,” Street told the station.

When police finally showed up, they talked to a witness who said he had seen two males wearing black hoods break into the home.

“[The officer said] there was nothing they could do about it,” Street said. “I asked him if they would’ve came on time, the guys would’ve still been there? He said, if you want us to have a faster response time, contact the mayor to see if we can arrive on time faster and have more police officers.”

Street said police never followed up with his mother, but that a week later he opened up his mail to find he’d been sent a misdemeanor ticket for “malicious use of communications device misuse of 911.” It said Street repeatedly called 911, escalating a police run because he was unsatisfied with the response time, according to WJBK.

He must appear in court and if convicted, faces a $500 fine and up to 90 days in jail. He plans to contest the ticket.

“They found the time to write me a ticket,” he said. “They never followed up with my mom about the investigation, the detective at all, but the detective actually had time to write me a ticket for that.”

NAPLES — When Barron Collier High School assistant football coach Johnny Drummond Smith was arrested Monday on a domestic battery charge, it would take several days to clear his name.

He was thrown in jail and held without bond, until defense attorney Michelle Hill provided Collier County Judge Vince Murphy with strong evidence: He couldn’t have been in Jacksonville when the crime occurred.

Murphy reviewed the evidence and Smith’s testimony and decided he should be released on a $1,000 bond. He walked out of jail Wednesday, but still was on leave from his job and faced prosecution in Duval County.

Friday, an assistant state attorney in Jacksonville dropped the case after investigators were unable to find Smith’s accuser and a witness, her sister.

For 38-year-old Smith, it was a quick end to a case of mistaken identity.

“Let’s say this happened to a convenience store employee who didn’t have all these people on his side, do you think this would have happened this quickly?” Hill asked. “The outcome would not have been the same.”

“We also got lucky with Judge Murphy,” she said. “Some other judges would have said, ‘A judge in Jacksonville set no bond, it’s no bond.’’’

On Friday, Anthony David Falangas, 25, of North Naples, stood before Collier Circuit Judge Fred Hardt, charged with two counts of attempting to obtain a prescription by fraud, a third-degree felony.

It was a hearing tailored to quickly prove his innocence and end Falangas’ troubles. He’d been thrown in jail July 8 and posted $5,000 bond a day later, but faces up to five years in state prison if convicted.

Defense attorney Donald Day wanted to prove Falangas, a salesman, was at work when someone used his stolen identification to fill two Roxicodone prescriptions at Wooley’s Pharmacy on June 26. The man fled while a pharmacist verified the prescriptions.

But the prosecutor didn’t have the exact time and the pharmacy video wasn’t working that day, so the judge ordered the State Attorney’s Office to provide the records and scheduled another hearing.

It was Falangas’ fourth time in court.

“We were hoping the video would have busted it wide open,” Day said of an arrest he suspects is linked to a recent bust of a large prescription drug ring that used stolen identities.

Like Falangas, Smith’s photograph was in the newspaper. Smith’s story also was on the TV news, where he professed his innocence.

Many charged in mistaken or stolen identity cases lose their jobs or are suspended from work. They suffer embarrassment, depression and anxiety and must pay an attorney and a bondsman.

“The unjustified loss of even a moment’s liberty is a tragedy,” Murphy said Friday. “. . . Sadly, Mr. Smith can never recover what was taken from him, but in the context of an admittedly imperfect system, we were able to allow his release fairly quickly.”

■ ■ ■

Like Falangas, Smith had an alibi: He was at work.

Shayla S. Evans, 25, of Jacksonville, told police Smith grabbed her hair and dragged her down a staircase at 4:25 p.m. Nov. 13, 2008, kicked her and beat her, then slashed her with a knife. She said they’d had a yearlong relationship, but had broken up four months earlier.

Smith was arrested Monday night after a Collier County deputy conducted a routine check of license tags. He knew nothing about the battery and was allowed to make a few calls, then was booked into the jail to await a hearing at 2 p.m. Tuesday.

In court, Hill asked Smith several questions to prove his innocence. Although Murphy granted a low bond, his release wasn’t quick.

“Jacksonville had to enter the bond into their system on that warrant and they couldn’t reach anyone in Jacksonville,” Hill said. “Thank God, we had a sergeant in the jail here who was a really nice guy and kept calling and calling.”

Duval court records list 209 cases involving Johnny Smiths, including two for Johnny D. Smith, who is only a month younger. Many have middle names or initials, but many are just Johnny Smith.

Evans’ sister believes she just wanted to protect her real boyfriend, so she picked a name, Johnny Smith, and pointed to a photo.

■ ■ ■

Hill said mistakes can occur when someone enters a name wrong in the national police computer, or someone, usually a relative, steals a name to avoid paying a ticket.

Two years ago, defendants with numerous aliases became such a problem in Collier that County Judge Christine Greider created a prototype legal order for judges to remove stolen names from court and county records.

County Judge Mike Carr had so many cases, he pushed the Sheriff’s Office to verify fingerprints of all defendants to confirm identities. He got The Florida Bar to change its professional ethics rules to force lawyers whose clients have provided false information to disclose it in court.

Hill represents a man whose brother used his name when he got a traffic citation.

“Of course, the brother didn’t go to court,” Hill said of the innocent man. “Then months and months later, he gets arrested on a warrant and can’t get out.”

Nowadays, Hill said, mistaken identity cases are straightened out more quickly due to technology.

Information is put through the Florida Department of Law Enforcement’s driver and vehicle information database which pulls up a driver license photo, Hill said.

Officials also can check fingerprints at the jail, which pulls up a photo and prior arrests if there’s a “hit.” That fingerprint check often reveals suspects who provide fake names.

Although technology helps unravel a mixup, it also prompted an increase in identity theft.

“It’s so perfected now,” Day said. “You could print out a nice ID on your computer. This is happening in every city in the U.S. You’d be shocked at how often it happens. The problem is it’s very difficult to resolve.”

Falangas’ license was stolen and his credit card information also was obtained, Day said, although it’s uncertain how or when.

“It’s very common for someone to call our office and say, ‘I’ve been charged with something in Tallahassee and I’ve never been in Tallahassee,” Day said.

Although a law went into effect a few years ago that requires law enforcement officers to get a thumb print from drivers who don’t provide a license, Day said it’s not always done.

“That law was to protect us,” Day said. “I’ve had clients who have had nine-page driving records in places they’ve never been.”

■ ■ ■

In July 2006, Theodore William Wuschke sued then- Collier County Sheriff Don Hunter and Deputy Charles H. Smith after he was arrested and thrown in jail after a routine traffic stop on July 7, 2002, because his name was an alias used by Robert James Mickens.

It was the second time in less than a year the 38-year-old Golden Gate man had been arrested and jailed on the 1993 warrant for a probation violation, according to his lawsuit in U.S. District Court, which said Wuschke didn’t have the tattoo on his right ankle that Mickens had.

The lawsuit accused Hunter of false arrest, false imprisonment and willfully failing to update inaccurate information in his agency’s computers after Wuschke’s first arrest on Oct. 1, 2001.

It was settled about a year later for $50,000.

“They made sure that wasn’t going to happen again,” said Wuschke’s attorney, Michael R.N. McDonnell of Naples, who said Wuschke had no prior convictions. “The poor guy was so upset. He was pleasant about it the first time. He understood it was a mistake.”

■ ■ ■

Jill Lennon, courts director for the Collier court clerks office, said people often come to the courthouse to say they received a notice their license was being suspended for something they didn’t do.

“We help and go above and beyond because that person is a victim,” Lennon said. “We walk them over to be fingerprinted at the Sheriff’s Office and to go to the State Attorney’s Office to straighten it out.”

Usually it’s a relative, she said, or the victim suspects someone and can’t prove it. Deputies try to find the real suspect, she said, but sometimes they can’t, “so we change them to John Doe in our computer.”

Unfortunately, cases such as these are becoming far too common. Identity theft is a serious problem.
You can also learn more about identity theft, please go to http://www.prepaidlegal.com/idt/bking62. -truthwillrise

New charges have been brought against a hacker already awaiting trials in two other cases of identity theft. In the latest indictment, 28-year-old Albert Gonzalez is accused of participating in the theft of 130 million credit card numbers. Two others are charged with conspiring in the crime.

Albert Gonzalez, 28, a hacker already in jail awaiting trial for what was deemed the largest identity theft in the U.S., has apparently topped himself. Along with two unnamed coconspirators, Gonzalez has been indicted by a federal grand jury in New Jersey for an identity theft that trumps the previous record-setter: 130 million credit and debit card numbers stolen over a two-year period, from 2006 to 2008.

At one point, Gonzalez was working as an informant with the U.S. Secret Service to hunt hackers, while at the same time allegedly stealing data.

Storied Resume

In August 2008, the Department of Justice fingered Gonzalez as the ringleader of a hacker gang that stole 40 million credit card numbers — then believed to be the largest single case of hacking theft. Consumers at T.J. Maxx, Barnes & Noble, Sports Authority and OfficeMax were victimized in that raid. Those charges were filed in the District of Massachusetts. Gonzalez will face them in a trial scheduled to begin in 2010.

In May 2008, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York charged Gonzalez in connection with the hacking of a computer network run by a national restaurant chain. Trial on those charges is scheduled to begin in Long Island, N.Y., in September 2009.

This latest episode is also the most audacious, according to the Department of Justice. The Miami-based Gonzalez and two Russian accomplices hacked into corporate databases five times over a two-year time period, using a SQL injection attack to target 7-Eleven, Heartland Payment Systems and Hannaford Brothers, a Maine-based supermarket chain, among other companies.

The three allegedly hacked into the networks and placed backdoor access in the systems to allow them to revisit without detection in order to steal the data. They would then send the data to servers in California, Illinois, Latvia, the Netherlands and Ukraine for resale to criminals.

If convicted, Gonzalez faces up to 35 years in prison and US$500,000 in fines.

The Department of Justice did not return the E-Commerce Times’ call requesting comment in time for publication.

The fact that Gonzalez acted as an informant for the Secret Service and then turned around and played the government “is a common problem in law enforcement — but particularly acute in the prosecution of cybercrimes,” said Alexander H. Southwell, an attorney with Gibson Dunn & Crutcher’s white collar defense and investigations practice.

“That is because prosecutors and law enforcement are very dependent on using insiders to penetrate criminal activity,” Southwell told the E-Commerce Times. “These cases are hard to crack without somebody on the inside because of the nature of cybercrime.”

Informers have a tendency to think that because they have protection from the government, they get a free pass on anything else they want to do, he noted.

Familiar Environment

Apart from the James Bond elements of these cases, they’re much the same as other massive identity thefts. Despite episode after episode, the underlying breeding ground hasn’t changed. That environment is characterized both by the government’s patchwork approach to protection — which often allows perpetrators to escape undetected — and the reluctance of retailers to implement stronger security measures.

The United States follows a “sectoral” approach to cybersecurity, M. Peter Adler, an attorney at Pepper Hamilton, told the E-Commerce Times.

“This means that regulations and industry standards pertaining to information security may vary slightly for companies in healthcare, financial services, [firms that have] government contracts or that use payment cards,” he explained.

“Layer state laws on this, such as those in Massachusetts and California, and a company is left with a patchwork quilt of protections that are often not completely understood and that can result in security gaps,” said Adler, adding that what the country really needs is a unified and comprehensive approach to cybersecurity that will keep up with the hackers.

“Credit card fraud can be stopped dead with numerous technologies that make the data useless to the thieves,” he noted, “but until banks, retailers and the credit card companies adopt them, the bleeding will continue.”

The recession is not helping, either.

Even if the government were strongly pushing more protective measures, said Adam Levin, cofounder of Identity Theft 911, it would have to balance those against the inevitable legitimate purchases stymied by such measures.

Furthermore, state governments in the forefront of enforcement have been forced to cut back because of budget cuts, he told the E-Commerce Times.

“Ultimately, it won’t be the government that solves this problem, but ultimate regulators of our economy — class action attorneys,” Levin concluded

This is just another instance of personal information being stolen and tens of millions are now potential victims of Identity Theft. It once again goes to show people it is not what we are doing with our information, but what others do with that information that can cause plenty of trouble. If you are concerned that you may be affected by this latest breach, or just concerned about Identity Theft, please log on to http://www.prepaidlegal.com/idt/bking62 or call 1-866-510-7907.